Maybe, but I like playing the part. Imagine you're in charge, and you have to ensure the survival of some of Earths species. The people of Earth are not going to be terribly productive are they? So how do you get together the required resources. The moon will have to have something like the Biosphere2 to send your people to. That test habitat had huge biomes that in the end just weren't big enough. All that for a small number of people. Resize it for a hundred or more people and many more animals, and you can see how much effort it's going to take.

I think there would be loads of weird * terrarists* using the giant rock as a sign that we have done something and be very exreme and if they could not escape they could not escape they would no want us to. But anyway away from the negative aspect if possible:
I think amateur rocketry and the large governments would have to ship paylods of goos to the moon, thousands of rockets fired there only taking 2 days to reach it! and the first priate rocke o space has already happened this year. Then with he crew exploration vehicle tests in 208 tey would have to advance his and crate infltable habitats to selter us on the moon, maybeon rockets hen to self fil on the moon for atleast a temp structure to hold the people. we could send up the matrials to build stations there and when we get there start building haitat. Afer we were struck, which hate to say bu would bean amazing seen from the moon! we would have t wait for the earth to become table and maybe speed his up somehow! then slowly start moving life back there years later! afterall prob still safer than mars!
NO?

Actually it can be argued either way which is safer the Moon or Mars. Each has pluses and minuses. The moon is closer, which is good if something goes wrong but it is a much harsher environment than Mars. Mars while further away has easier to extract life supporting resources.

The moon should come first, our first colony will involve the first real world testing of alot of theories and technologies. If the colony needs something, better to be able to get with a transit time of three days than a transit time of 5 months.

But an escape is a bit selfish if we don't also try to rescue some of the flora and fauna of our world. What do we take? Somethings are simply out of the question, like big whales, but should we try to save dolphins, cats, birds? Plants are a little easier, what with the seed bank at Kew Gardens storing 24,000 different species.

Pity we couldn't just take the genetic finger prints of things, and grow them wherever we end up.

The consequence of some industries is environmental contamination - may be a reason for going to space.

Some things cannot produced or developed on earth - at the ISS threedimensional tumors have been searched because the effect of chemical therapy on it couldn't searched sufficiently on earth - may be a reason for going to space too.

Other things may be easier to be made without gravity - but if they are big it will difficult to move them to the surface.

So "industrial manufacturing" needs to be considered in details perhaps down to elementary details.

I'm missing Transportion Services and Traffic - flights from Hamburg to Sydney are lasting much more than half a day. Going to space they might be reduced to 90 minutes. That's suborbital - yes - but the ends of the trajectories are very distant compared to the XPRIZE. Let's better use the term "Infrastructure" - it's expressing the point better than "Transportation and Traffic".

Some things cannot produced or developed on earth - at the ISS threedimensional tumors have been searched because the effect of chemical therapy on it couldn't searched sufficiently on earth - may be a reason for going to space too.

As someone who performs research on cancer I thought this one needed a bit of clearing up. So here is a link from which I think Ekkehard may have got his interpretation. (It's a bit dated though, from 2001)

Hey! Even I could go into space! That should be proof enough that almost anyone is eligible. In fact, in the future, I think it might be possible that you would have to work very hard in order to not be eligible to serve some sort of useful function in an off world colony somewhere.

In general the different attractiveness of Moon and Mars is of a similar nature as the difference between Berlin and Sydney seen from Hamburg: The first is nearer and you can get there within a short time, visit and then return within a short time - the other is far away and long vacations are needed to visit it or you have to work and to live there.

That may change if one day drives providing higher velocities are available, but here a financial barrier is found that requires "exploitation" of the Mars by work and industries. You would have to give several years of your life to see the martian surface. And from these thoughts looking out to the outer planets nebulous at the horizon the first edge of the barrier of time seems to show itself - the need to live the whole life upon moons or asteroids as the only chance mankind has to move to the stars, a need increasing by distance, by every billion of km on the way out of the solar system.